The Valentines’ Kick Off

With their mix of cultural egos, it is more mangling than mingling for the Gen-Xers. Romance for them is make-believe and simple in its way - from chatting on the Net to telepals and email buddies, love nests everywhere. Reaching your beloved is never too hard - you could try the Morse code, the pigeon carrier or the pony express service… the stranger the better!

And that is exactly what the atmosphere at The Country Club embodied all through Saturday. With Lipton Ice Tea and event managers Trump It coming together to charge the air with fun and love, Valentice got underway pretty early.

On the sprawling grounds of the club, they set up various stalls catering to the mindset of the teenagers and the college-going crowd, and decked the whole area in chrome yellow - the color of the brand. Though scheduled 3:00pm onwards, it wasn't really until 5pm that the crowd started trickling in. And they came in all decked and set to enjoy the start of the Valentine week.

And there were games galore, both the rudimentary and the imaginative. Air-gun aimingand breaking the castle were among the oldest and the most popular. And there were new ones, like one that asked its male participants to braid their female companions' hair in a limited time-span. It wasn't a surprise when not many females felt that their guys were up to the challenge.

The most popular, easily, was the 'request-a-song' stand, where you could dedicate songs for that special one. And with the youngsters in the crowd trying to outdo each other, we got a feast of romantic numbers throughout the day. The most popular numbers were the refusing-to-age "Nothing's Gonna Change…", and the not-so-old "A Little Bit Of Monica…". Now what does that tell us about the lovers of today? We don't even want to think about that.

But real party started when the club members, who were allowed free entry, started making coming in, well past 7 in the evening. And it was time for the live band, especially brought down from Mumbai, to start their gig. Hi-Tide came and all but swept the gathered crowd over. Fully tempered by the day's festivities, the steel was red hot and all ready to be struck, and the people went into a veritable frenzy as the band played one popular number after another. But the kind of mood the crowd was in, it wouldn't have mattered what they played. But play they did, and quite well, too.

And some two hours of non-stop gyrations later, the music winded up and the day drew to a close, after the various contest winners received their prizes. Overall, it was a great way to hit off the season of love, with your valentine - and God knows how many may even have found theirs!

AG